Semi-grand ensembles

General Features

Semi-grand ensembles are used in Monte Carlo simulation of mixtures.

In this ensembles the total number of molecules is fixed, but the composition can change.

Canonical Ensemble: fixed volume, temperature and number(s) of molecules

We will consider a binary system;. In the Canonical Ensemble, the differential equation energy for the Helmholtz energy function can be written as:

$d(\beta A)=Ed\beta -(\beta p)dV+\sum _{i=1}^2(\beta {\mu }_i)d{N}_i$,

where:

• $A$ is the Helmholtz energy function
• $\beta \equiv 1/k_{B}T$
• $k_B$ is the Boltzmann constant
• $T$ is the absolute temperature
• $E$ is the internal energy
• $p$ is the pressure
• ${\mu }_i$ is the chemical potential of the species "i"
• $N_i$ is the number of molecules of the species "i"

Semi-grand ensemble at fixed volume and temperature

Consider now that we want to consider a system with fixed total number of particles, $N$

$N=N_1+N_2$;

but the composition can change, from the thermodynamics we can apply a Legendre's transform [HAVE TO CHECK ACCURACY] to the differential equation written above in terms of $A(T,V,N_1,N_2)$.

1. Consider the change $(N_1,N_2)\to (N,N_2)$